Friday, October 28, 2016

As you know by now, the Poptropica Creators LOVE Halloween! There's so much fun stuff happening on Poptropica but you only have a few more days to enjoy it all! Be sure to visit the Home Island so you can...

🎃 Make a fun picture in the Halloween photo booth and enter our membership giveaway. Check out this awesome pic from last year -- we bet you can make something this creative, too!

👻 Get new and classic Poptropica Halloween costumes in the store! There's a creepy puppet, wolf girl/boy, bog monster, and so much more!

👽 Spin the Halloween spinning wheel every day to earn credits to buy all that cool stuff in the store!

😈 Play the Haunted House mini-quest! Just click on the spooky gravestone outside the arcade on the Home Island. Get a zombie costume and power when you complete it, and costumize from all the creepy inhabitants at the party!

Most of the Halloween fun on Poptropica will be gone after Halloween so enjoy it while you can. Go play now on Poptropica and have a Happy Halloween!

Thursday, October 27, 2016

As you know, Monster Carnival Island is an October Island of the Month. One of my favorite parts of the Island is when the carnival workers get hypnotized and turn into creepy monsters! Did you ever wonder how the Poptropica Creators came up with the monsters' looks?

Well, I did a little digging and found some awesome art the Creators did as they were designing the carnival workers and monsters! That video above was made by a Creator who was animating the ferris wheel monster. Cool, huh? Check these out...

Early sketches of Monster Carnival characters

Early sketches of a Monster Carnival demon

Early drawings of the duck game guy - he could have looked a lot different!

Sketches of two carnival monsters

Drawings of six looks for the duck game monster

Carnival workers and their monster alter-egos

And here's a look into the animation process for the duck game monster:

So. Amazing. Right?

I hope you liked this behind-the-scenes look at the creation of Monster Carnival. Go play it now on Poptropica and earn big credits: 500 for 1st-time finishers and a one-time 300 credit bonus for repeat finishers! And don't forget we now have a Monster Carnival walkthrough to help you if you get stuck!

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

Hey there, Poptropicans! Halloween is getting closer and closer. We're betting you're as excited as we are! To help you get in even more in the mood, why not decorate your computer with our Poptropica Halloween wallpaper?

Do you know which Island this is from and where you can find it? I bet you longtime Poptropicans know!

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Have you made a fun picture in the Halloween photo booth on the Home Island? We want to see it!

For the rest of October we'll be looking for your Halloween photo booth pics on Twitter and Instagram. Post your art on one of those channels and use the hashtag #PoptropicaFun. If you don't have an account on Twitter or Instagram, ask an adult to post for you. You have to use the hashtag to enter the contest on those channels, or it doesn't count!

We'll also look for Halloween photo booth pics that are posted to our Facebook page -- so you (or your favorite adult) can enter your pic that way, too.

We'll repost some of our favorite pictures AND we'll award one-month Poptropica memberships to randomly-picked Halloween photo booth pictures throughout the rest of the month. Awesome!

🎃 First off, head over to the Poptropica Store to get your delightfully creepy puppet costume! This super special costume is free for members and 400 credits for non-members.

🎃 Short on credits? Go spin the Halloween Spinning Wheel! Spin it every day to build up those credits -- trust us, you're going to need them...

🎃 And be sure to hop on over to the arcade and look for the spooky gravestone outside it. Click on it to play our Haunted House mini-quest. When you complete it you get an awesome zombie costume and power! Plus at the very end of the quest, there are lots of frightfully fantastic costumes you can costumize.

Well, now we've got another pretty cool thing to show you: Poptropica Creator Jon Pitcher is giving you a first look at monster worm that will make an appearance in the New Poptropica!

Jon was kind enough to write a guest post for us today on what exactly goes into designing a new creature for Poptropica, while giving you an exclusive look at the creeptastic monster worm he created. Take it away, Jon!

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Thanks, Skinny Moon!

When we design our creatures for Poptropica, it’s important to start with rough sketches to explore a wide range of emotions and poses, like this one:

These kinds of drawings help us to quickly rough out the personality and attitudes and dig deeper into who the creature is and how it reacts when it is curious, provoked, irritated, angered, or lulled to sleep. This also helps us to figure out the way it would move as an animated character.

After we feel good about our creature on paper, we create it as a vector illustration:

This is created in a neutral pose without color to focus on making the design look clean and solid while still maintaining the character and appeal. If we can build our design to be able to pull off happy, bored, angry, sad, and puzzled expressions through both the face and body poses, then we have what we need to move forward.

Next it’s very important to explore what colors are appropriate for our creature to help it fit comfortably in its environment and also stand out in a fun, appealing way:

The colors should also reflect the personality of the creature and help the audience feel happy, disgusted, peaceful, or whatever emotion the artist intended. This worm monster has wildly saturated yellows and reds on the face to show its extreme personality and a speckled brown body to show how it fits into its earthy, dirt-covered home.

We're almost done: Now it’s time to build the animation rig! This is a technical process of building a puppet using lots of bones and curved lines with handles so that we can control the attitudes of the body and face then pose them into any position we need:

This worm monster was a complicated rig to build. Each tentacle is set up so that the animator can pose it into any wet noodle-type shape that they desire.

And now it’s time to ice the cake with some fun character animations!

The animator’s job is to take the rigged puppet and set it up into hundreds of poses until it comes to life. It takes thirty poses to create one second of animation! Simply making it move is not enough. A successful animator knows how a human or animal body can move in a way that is not only entertaining but believable as if it were a real, living creature. This takes a thorough understanding of timing, weight, and acting.

The end result is a monster worm that can create a simple emotion in the person that views it. It is colorful, wiggly, and a little crazy. What is your reaction? Perhaps some might want one for a pet, but most would likely run away screaming!

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Thanks for this amazing behind-the-scenes look into the New Poptropica, Jon! What do you think about this monster worm, Poptropicans? Pretty awesome, huh?

We hope you liked getting a look at a New Poptropica creature and learning about the design process!

Thursday, October 6, 2016

It's October, and that means it's time to start celebrating Halloween on Poptropica!

We have so much fun stuff planned for this month. First up: We've brought back the Halloween photo booth! It's on the Home Island -- just look for the witch. Start playing around with it and check out all the cool features. Make a photo and share it with your friends!

Starting next week you'll be able to submit your Halloween photos to the Poptropica Creators. We'll randomly pick from players' photos and award one-month memberships throughout October -- and we'll feature some of our favorites on our social media!

And check out the Poptropica Store!

It's now packed with classic Poptropica Halloween cards and costumes! Zoom on over to the store to deck yourself out in some sweet, spooky duds to get in the spirit -- I know I have...

Later this month we'll be debuting some awesome new Halloween stuff in the store! So be sure to spin that wheel on the Home Island every day to build up your credits and play the Islands of the Month to earn extra-big credits!

It was very difficult, Poptropicans, but the Poptropica Creators have picked the winners of the #PoptropicaArt Contest! As I mentioned in previous posts, there were so many amazing entries that we picked more than three winners. In addition to first, second, and third place, we have 8 honorable mentions!

First place gets a six-month Poptropica membership and a bunch of Poptropica swag

Second place gets a three-month Poptropica membership and a bunch of Poptropica swag

Third place gets a one-month Poptropica membership and a bunch of Poptropica swag

And our honorable mentions all get a one-month Poptropica membership

Congratulations to all of you, and thanks so much to everyone for entering. Seeing your creativity and enthusiasm for Poptropica was really, truly amazing for all the Creators.

Without further ado, here are the winners of the 2016 #PoptropicaArt Contest! Click on each piece of art to see it full-scale...

FIRST PLACE: Maryann P.

Poptropica Creator comments on Maryann P.'s art:

"Poptropica is about storytelling. I like that this image tells a story. Plus, the artist did a great job rendering Binary Bard's universe. It is very rich in detail and perspective, which really stood out to me."

"Maryann P.'s uses great colors and mood in a nice storytelling format."

"I like the scale and level of detail!"

SECOND PLACE: Crafty Poptropican

Poptropica Creator comments on Crafty Poptropican's art:

"The appealing, fun colors and character attitudes of Crafty Poptropican's piece really knock it out of the park."

"This artist captured 4 of my favorite villains in a fun and creative way. Their use of color and imagery reminded me of the dreams on Super Villain Island."

"I could see this hanging on a wall."

THIRD PLACE: Slanted Fish

Poptropica Creator comments on Slanted Fish's art:

"I love the action in this image! I also really like how the artist placed some of the avatars outside of the frame. When I look at this I feel like Omegon is just ready to emerge out of the background."

"Slanted Fish did a great job pushing the action poses and staging the characters in a way that it feels like an epic battle."

"What an action-packed image! Love the details and colors."

HONORABLE MENTIONS

by @yuneiko_

by @yazz._.minne

by Tiger35767

by @smileyfaceorg

posted by Shaky Skunk

posted by @julia_henry_la

by Creepy Goose

by Brave Tomato

Winners, we will contact you on the social media account where you posted your winning art!